Snow-Day Safety
Blizzard keeping you from going to the gym? No worries. Shoveling that driveway will tone your entire body and torch nearly 400 calories an hour.
"But as with any other workout, you can injure yourself if you don't take the proper precautions," says Donna Stein-Harris, with the National Safety Council in Itasca, Illinois. She recommends spacing your hands a foot apart on the handle for more lifting leverage and squatting down with your legs apart and back straight rather than bending at the waist. "Let your shoulders, torso, and thighs do most of the work," says Stein-Harris. Finally, turn your whole body to dump the snow instead of tossing it over your shoulder. "A sudden twisting motion," she says, "can cause you to pull a back muscle."
© 2008 Weider Publications, LLC, a subsidiary of